What’s really at stake when Rich Franklin and Cung Le face off in Macau? And are we getting ahead of ourselves with all this talk of Georges St-Pierre and Anderson Silva meeting in the cage after UFC 154?

In this week’s installment of Twitter Mailbag, MMAjunkie.com’s Ben Fowlkes looks at those questions and much more, with at least one reference to the performance-enhancing drugs featured in the great cartoons of his youth.

Check out all the questionin’ and answerin’ below, and submit your own query on Twitter to @BenFowlkesMMA.

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ATX Steve M @atxsteve17
@benfowlkesMMA q: does the Franklin Le winner matter in any rankings, or is it just for the show? #tmb

If we’re talking about whether the winner of this fight has any realistic hopes of fighting for a UFC title as a result, then no, it’s not a fight that matters. Rich Franklin and Cung Le are a combined 78 years old. Time is running out on both of them. Le seems more interested in chasing a movie career than a title, and Franklin has already had all the cracks we need to see him get at Anderson Silva. Don’t get me wrong, I like Franklin and enjoy watching him fight, but does anybody think a third meeting with Silva would go any better for him or for his nose?

This is another one of those “fun fights” we’ve heard so much about recently. But in fairness, it does seem like it will actually be a lot of fun to watch. Le has an entertaining style, and Franklin always comes to battle, so who cares if it has no impact on the rankings? It’s on cable TV on a Saturday morning. Get some donuts and some coffee and enjoy yourself. We’ll get back to the fights that actually matter in Montreal next weekend.

TheKidd @VineStreetLife
@benfowlkesMMA If GSP beats Condit, what are the odds that the Spider goes all “Sonnen” on GSP to provoke a showdown? I say 75%. #tmb

You’re forgetting something very important: Chael Sonnen used his mouth to get fights because he had to. He knew it was the most effective tool he had. Anderson Silva does not have that problem. As far as most English-speaking fans are concerned, Silva could have his voice box removed and it wouldn’t matter. People want to see him against Georges St-Pierre because they want to see the fight, not the interview. That’s why – while I understand why the UFC would want to usher Silva into the cage for a quick staredown if GSP beats Carlos Condit at UFC 154 – it still seems kind of weird and scripted, especially if we’re talking about it this far out. The best way to convince the MMA gods to screw with your best-laid plans is to talk about them like there’s nothing that could possibly go wrong.

Kristofir Napier @KrisNapier
@benfowlkesMMA if you had to choose one Mma fighter to be the president of the US, who would you choose? #TMB

Brian Stann. I get the sense that we might not agree on all the policy issues, but he’s an honest, ethical man, which is more than you can say for most politicians. I’d love to see him run for office when his fighting career is over, but as he told me when I asked him about it recently, he prides himself on being someone who will speak his mind and tell the truth, “so I’m not sure which party would have me.”

Prolapse Washington @ProlapseWashing
@benfowlkesMMA why so negative re WSOF? every sport has minor leagues, and fans still show up to them. They did a good job

If you think it’s too negative to point out things that a promotion did wrong in addition to things it did right, you should read press releases rather than MMA news sites. Our job is to call it like we see it, good or bad. The World Series of Fighting debut had both, as I pointed out in my column. That’s to be expected from a new organization, but it doesn’t mean we should sweep the problems under the rug just to be polite.

As for your minor league comparison, I’m not sure it holds up. WSOF isn’t some minor league affiliate that the UFC set up to cultivate talent. It’s an MMA promotion trying to make its own way and build its own stars. Those stars might harbor dreams of fleeing for the UFC some day, much like minor league baseball players dream of making it to the majors, but the system is not set up to facilitate that the way it is in other sports.

Also, most minor league teams operate in cities where there is no major league option. That’s part of their appeal. When I go down to the ballpark in summer to watch the Missoula Osprey play, I know I’m not seeing the best baseball players around. But hey, the tickets are cheap, so is the beer, and it’s easier than driving eight hours to Seattle to see the Mariners. WSOF, on the other hand, held its debut event in Las Vegas, which sees plenty of big-time MMA each year. Convincing that crowd to show up for “minor league” MMA, which the town already has plenty of, is not so easy. Just ask the WEC and Strikeforce Challengers.

You know the difference between a one-time steroid cheat and a two-time steroid cheat? It’s the difference between people believing that you screwed up and used steroids and them believing that you screwed up and got caught. The first time Bonnar got busted he said he’d been “desperate” after an injury. So he used, got caught, did his penance, and we assumed he’d learned his lesson. Clearly though, he didn’t. That makes you wonder how many other fights he had not learned his lesson for. Especially after retiring on this note, the steroid stain is one that’s going to stick with Bonnar and color how we remember the entirety of his career in the UFC.

James Parker @SometimesJames
@benfowlkesMMA Have we considered that Bonnar may have been on steroids BEFORE he got the call to take the fight? It was last minute.. #TMB

It’s possible, but let’s not forget that Bonnar thought of himself as more or less retired before this offer came through. As much as he loves to strike bodybuilder poses with his shirt off, I’m not sure I see him hanging out at the gym and shooting steroids just to look good. Or at least, I really hope that’s not what was going on since that would be so much sadder.

kevin janke @rivergiants
@benfowlkesMMA #TMB If GSP fights Silva, what happens to both belts? If GSP beats Condit and gets hurt against Silva, back to midwght limbo

Chances are they’d fight at a catchweight, with neither belt officially on the line. That’s the right way to do it, especially if neither man is interested in hanging around in the other’s division and defending the new title after winning it. There’s still the chance that GSP or Silva might get hurt in this epic superfight and knock a title out of circulation for a while, but that risk is always part of this business. The last time GSP got hurt it was in his own gym. We can’t start treating our champions like classic cars that we’re afraid to take out on the road.

Best kickboxer, maybe, and as long as his opponents consent to a kickboxing match with MMA gloves, as Travis Bartlett did, but we still don’t know what he can do in an MMA bout against a real opponent. A lot of strikers look great when no one is threatening to take them down. Bartlett fought like he knew it was his job to get knocked out and he wanted to hurry up and get it over with. That’s not to say Spong won’t be a success in MMA. Certainly, I’m excited to see what he can do. I just hope WSOF gives him some competition next time, now that his highlight reel is sufficiently padded.

Zack Melton @ZackMelt
@benfowlkesMMA will we ever see the UFC go to VADA, WADA (or a similar group) for year round PED testing? If so, when? If not, why? #TMB

If you’re asking me to look into the future, sorry, I can’t do it. I can tell you that if the UFC wants to do something about performance-enhancing drug use (if, mind you), year-round, random, unannounced testing is the way to go. It doesn’t necessarily have to engage the services of an outside organization to do that, but I think it’s pretty clear that you can’t rely on athletic commissions with limited budgets and predictable procedures to get it done. We’ve tried that, and the PED problem in this sport is not getting any better. The UFC could do a lot to change that, but it won’t be easy or cheap. In the long run, I think it will be more expensive to keep putting it off.

Nick Raymond @NickolasRaymond
@benfowlkesMMA #tmb Is the main reason why UFC doesn’t do random drug testing is that it could easily destroy their current fight schedule?

I doubt it. I think the UFC would rather catch serial dopers months out, before it’s put them on posters and in TV ads to sell a pay-per-view. Remember what happened with Alistair Overeem? If the UFC could have seen that one coming thanks to its own testing program, it could have saved some time and money. Even the cheaters who only get exposed after the event, such as Bonnar, still create a huge distraction. You should see how many more TMB questions I got about Bonnar than about the UFC’s debut in China this Saturday. Even if you ignore the moral responsibility the UFC has to ensure a safe(r) working environment for fighters, there’s still the practical concern any promoter has of keeping fans focused on future events rather than recent screw-ups. When the MMA news cycle is dominated by stories of the latest drug cheats, that’s tough to do.

Jared @Orderx7
@benfowlkesMMA What makes Jon Jones so good? I hear his name thrown around as the greatest, maybe we’re jumping the gun here, maybe?? #tmb

Jumping the gun and completely overreacting is one of the things the Internet does best, so yeah, it’s possible that we’ve gotten ahead ourselves when it comes to Jon Jones. At the same time, he’s a 25-year-old guy who started fighting professionally just a little over four years ago, and already he’s beaten five former UFC champions in fights that weren’t even really competitive. I think Anderson Silva still lays claim to the title of best eva, as Phil Baroni might say, but what Jones has done is damn impressive.

Baltasar Shepard @BaltasarShepard
@benfowlkesMMA What martial art would you like to see in MMA, for funsies? Capoeira? That one that Batman uses? W/e it is that Seagal does?

I would love to see some UFC fighter employ “that one that Batman uses,” but only if Bruce Buffer would refer to him as a “that one martial art that Batman uses fighter” in the pre-fight introductions. Because that’d be awesome.

Jesse Raine @jesseraine
@benfowlkesMMA Am I the only 1 that gets sick of fighters saying they do it for the fans?They do it to get paid, it’s not wrong,just say it!

Fair enough, Jesse. But even if we assume that all fighters do this only to get paid, we have to ask ourselves how they get paid. Answer: the fans. OK, so it’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s essentially what it boils down to. Fans pay the UFC, and the UFC pays the fighters. It also tends to pay more to the fighters who more fans are willing to pay to see. Point is, there’s a connection between having fans (for the purposes of this discussion, let’s say fans are people willing to pay to see you fight, whether they want you to win or lose) and receiving money.

But to your deeper point, there’s a difference between doing something for a living and doing it only to get paid. Everybody needs money to survive, so we all come up with ways of acquiring it, but I think we also recognize that the ideal situation is one where we are paid to do something we want to do anyway. Fighters (most of them, anyway) have found that. As Cain Velasquez told me when I talked to him recently, “I love working out for a living.” Because MMA is an extremely competitive environment that favors the young and the healthy, they know they have to make as much as they can while they can, but it doesn’t mean that they’re in it just for the money.

I think the media always welcomes competition among MMA organizations, as do fighters. The more viable options there are, the better it is for everyone, fans included. But that doesn’t mean we feel any obligation to pretend that a new promotion is better or more sustainable than it is. Our job is to tell it like it is, not like we might want it to be.

JoeMMA @JoeMMA83
@benfowlkesMMA how about this, better of 2012: the fights scrapped due to injuries or the fights that happened to replace injured fighters?

The thing about the fights that didn’t happen is that we don’t know what we missed out on. It’s easy for us to lament the loss of Daniel Cormier vs. Frank Mir or Jon Jones vs. Dan Henderson, but for all we know those fights could have turned out to be duds. Thinking about them now is like thinking about some girl in high school you never got up the courage to ask out. The two of you might have hated each other if you’d ever taken the time to find out. Or she might have initially agreed to the date, only to cancel at the last minute after tearing her ACL. Best not to dwell on it.

Albert Heredia @albertrebla
@benfowlkesMMA If Anderson can’t be beat with high testosterone or steroids, what does the trick? Tiger blood? Bath salts?

We can look at Silva’s record against drug users and tell that chemistry is not the answer. He’s beaten fighters on testosterone, steroids, painkillers, anti-anxiety meds – you name it. Unless some fighter gets ahold of Popeye’s spinach or the magic juice that the Gummi Bears used to drink, we can forget about anybody beating Silva with the help of outside substances. Actually, now that I think about it, those Gummi Bears were a bunch of PED-using cheaters. Take away that juice, and they had nothing. Really makes you wonder why the local cartoon forest commission didn’t crack down on them.

It’s true that featuring Alistair Overeem in a workout supplement ad while he’s currently unlicensed due to his unsanctioned testosterone use is maybe not the best idea, especially if the ad is going to show off how much he can bench press. That’d be like putting Nick Diaz in an ad for “water pipes.” Even if the thing he’s hawking in the ad is not itself illegal, it can’t help but remind us of the other thing. Somebody really should have thought that one through.

Luke Williamson @ltw0303
@benfowlkesMMA Why does some of the MMA media believe Bisping is close to a title shot? Everytime he has fought a top guy he has lost.

Michael Bisping has lost four fights in his MMA career, and to the likes of Rashad Evans, Dan Henderson, Wanderlei Silva and Chael Sonnen. Three of those four were decisions that could have gone the other way. That doesn’t immediately make him a top contender, but it should help at least keep him in the conversation. As for why he might be close to a middleweight title shot, well, there just aren’t that many other options. If he beats Vitor Belfort (and he is not favored to do so, according to oddsmakers), he’ll be right there with the winners of Chris Weidman vs. Tim Boetsch and Alan Belcher vs. Yushin Okami. Eventually Anderson Silva has to fight a middleweight again, so any of those guys could be one win away from a title shot. Will it be Bisping? I wouldn’t count on it. But then, I never would have guessed that Chael Sonnen would be next in line for a crack at Jon Jones, either.

Ben Fowlkes is MMAjunkie.com and USA TODAY’s MMA columnist. Follow him on Twitter at @BenFowlkesMMA. Twitter Mailbag appears every Thursday on MMAjunkie.com.